Monday 9 September 2013

PRONI: Ulster Presbyterianism's First Historians

On Tuesday 17 September, PRONI will be hosting Ulster Presbyterianism’s First Historians. An overview of the lecture, by Dr Robert Armstrong, Senior History lecturer in the Dept of History, Trinity College, Dublin, is below.

How does a community understand its own past? By the 1660s there had been an organized Presbyterian presence in Ulster for over twenty years, and individuals with Presbyterian convictions for much longer. But it was now that the ministers and elders, meeting together, decided to sponsor an account of their history, drawing from their records and the memories of those who had taken part in stirring events and patient building up of their cause.

This lecture will look at the stories told by Patrick Adair, Andrew Stewart, Robert Blair and John Livingstone. It will ask what went into making the ‘Presbyterian Story’ in 17th-century Ulster. How did these men understand the events they had experienced in their own days? Or those of much earlier times? How did their version of the past challenge those told from other perspectives within Ireland? How did the stories they told shape Presbyterian memories for later generations?

The lecture will take place at 2pm. Admission is FREE but you need to book. Please contact PRONI to secure your place at proni@dcalni.gov.uk